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Road, waiting for me, always waiting, suddenly flashes through my mind.

    When I get home Jeffrey’s out in the yard, chopping wood in the rain. He sees me and nods his head, lifts his arm and wipes sweat from above his top lip with his sleeve. Then he grabs a log, lifts the ax again, and splits it easily. He splits another. And another. The pile of chopped wood at his feet is already pretty big, and he doesn’t look like he’s stopping anytime soon.

    “You deciding to stock up for the whole winter? Can’t wait for the snow?” I ask. “You do know it’s only September.”

    “Mom’s cold,” he says. “She’s in there in her flannel pj’s, wrapped up in blankets drinking tea, and she’s shivering. I thought I’d build her a fire.”

    “Oh,” I say. “That’s nice of you.”

    “Something happened to her that day. With the Black Wing,” he says, trying out the words. He looks up, meets my eyes. Sometimes he looks so young, like a vulnerable little boy.
    Other times, like now, he looks like a man. A man who’s seen so much sadness in this life. How is that possible? I wonder. He’s fifteen.

    “Yeah,” I say, because I’ve concluded the same thing. “I mean, he tried to kill her. It was a pretty rough fight.”

    “Is she going to be okay?”

    “I think so.” The glory healed her. I watched it wash over her like warm water, taking away the burns, the bruises from Samjeeza’s hands. But thinking about it brings back the image of her dangling from his arm, flailing, gasping for breath as his hand tightened around her throat, her kicks growing weaker and weaker until she went still. Until I thought she was dead. My eyes burn at the memory and I quickly turn away to look at the house so Jeffrey won’t see my tears.

    Jeffrey chops some more wood, and I pull myself together. It’s been a long day. I want to crawl into bed, pull the covers up over my head, and sleep it all away.

    “Hey, where were you that day?” I ask suddenly.

    He goes with playing dumb. “When?”

    “The day of the fire.”

    He grabs another block of wood and places it on the stand. “I told you. I was in the woods, looking for you. I thought maybe I could help.”

    “Why don’t I believe that?”

    He falters and the ax strikes the log unevenly and sticks. He makes a noise like a growl and jerks it out.

    “Why wouldn’t you believe me?” he asks.

    “Um, maybe because I know you, and you’re acting all weird. So where were you? Cut the crap.”

    “Maybe you don’t know me as well as you think.” He throws the ax in the dirt, then gathers an armload of the chopped wood and pushes past me toward the house.

    “Jeffrey . . .”

    “It was nothing,” he says. “I got lost.” Suddenly he looks like he’s the one about to cry.
    He goes into the house, and I can hear him offering to make a fire for Mom. I stand in the yard until the first curls of smoke drift out of the top of our chimney. I remember his face when he flew out of the trees that night, tight with fear and something like pain. I remember the hollow way he laughed at me when I told him that I saved Tucker, and suddenly I’m all twisted up with worry for him, because whatever he was doing out there that day, my gut tells me that it wasn’t good.

    My brother has his secrets, too.

Chapter 4
Freaking Out

    This time in the dream, there are stairs. A set of ten or twelve concrete steps, complete with a black handrail, leading up between two aspen trees. Why would there be stairs in the middle of the forest? And where do they lead to? I grab the rail. It’s rough, the paint flaking off to expose patches of rust. The steps are edged with moss. As I climb I notice I’m wearing nice shoes, Mom’s sensible black pumps, the ones she always loans me for formal occasions.

    I see Jeffrey ahead of me in the trees. Others wait there too, shadowy figures at the top of the hillside, people I recognize: Angela, Mr. Phibbs, Wendy. It feels like they’re